Home Sick

Poor droopy Simon got dragged to work with Mom yesterday morning, where he witnessed her semi-expert 6th grade pedagogical skills while wearing out the battery on her iPod. In the afternoon the sniffler got to watch "Cars," and Mom tried to catch up on e-mails while making squash soup and sweet potato pie. (Riz Rollins's recipe, published years ago in The Stranger, contains about as much useful detail as the Igguldens' treehouse instructions, but it makes up for that with deeper wisdom like: "You need two pie crusts, because there ain't no sense trying to get away with one pie," and "Ain't nobody gonna be your friend if you can't boil no real potato.")

We've had worse sick days, for sure. But things really perked up when Josie got home from school, and she and Simon got busy with the body crayons and the tiny skateboard we found at the drug store when we were stocking up on Tylenol: